Ariana Grande has spent the last 18 months talking about disappearing. During podcast appearances in 2024 and 2025, she discussed her plans to slow down and fade out, and described her then-forthcoming Eternal Sunshine tour – her first run of live shows since 2019 – as a “last hurrah”. Often, her own interest in being Ariana Grande has come into question, as she’s seemed to find greater creative bliss in musical theatre and acting – her first loves – than pop stardom. Similarly, she’s hinted in her new music at a tangled, oppressive dynamic with her own fandom. “Is it really my fault,” she sings on her recent No 1 single “Hate That I Made You Love Me”, “you all gave me your hearts of your own accord?”
So that slightly hectoring statement from her spokesperson last month, in which Grande announced an indefinite break due to “endless, ongoing public scrutiny”, seemed almost unnecessary. And strange, even, arriving just days after the release of a Grande music video that explicitly referenced weight loss, frustration and unhappiness… and inevitably sparked a tidal wave of concern among fans about Grande’s health and state of mind. It’s tough sometimes to be an Ariana Grande fan – you never quite know where you should stand, how much you should say, or how much you should expect to receive in return.
